Read Online Wild by Jill Sorenson - Free Book Online Page B

loafers. There was another pair for her inside the bag. Not the right size, but close enough. She slipped them on, hoping they wouldn’t be arrested for looting.
    Properly shod, they prepared to leave again. Mateo put his right arm around Chloe, urging her forward. There was a park and a bike path at this end of the peninsula. Seaside Village, a shopping area, was on the other side. They needed to move past the shops to reach the mainland. It wasn’t a long way, but their progress was slow.
    Chloe struggled against a wave of despair. She wasn’t sure they’d be able to reach safety or find help along the way. A bridge had collapsed. People were trapped in buildings. Neighborhoods were on fire.
    Tsunami or no tsunami, they might not be able to escape this hellhole.
    What if the embarcadero was safer than downtown? Maybe they should stay put and pray for rescue.
    Mateo didn’t appear to be suffering from any indecision. For a stranger in a strange land, he seemed rather confident. He stuck to his plan, whatever it was. They established a rhythm, loping across the park together. Without him, she couldn’t have limped more than a hundred feet. He moved like a well-oiled machine, tireless and smooth. Sweat gathered on his forehead and snaked down his jaw. She wondered how old he was. He had the hard muscles of a man, but so did some teenagers.
    The earth rumbled beneath them, threatening to break apart. Chloe pictured a huge rift opening up and swallowing them whole. She dropped to the grass with Emma, making a shield with her body. Mateo got down on his knees and threw his arms around them both.
    Oh, God. This was the end.
    It seemed too cruel to imagine they would survive the bridge, the submerged vehicle and the near drowning, only to get crushed by a falling tree or swept away in a tidal wave.
    When the shaking subsided, Chloe lifted her head. Mateo stared at her, breathing hard. They were still alive. There was no tsunami. He stood, studying their surroundings. This quake hadn’t felt as strong as the others.
    “We’re okay,” she said, hugging Emma to her chest. “We’re okay.”
    They kept moving away from the coast. Chloe’s thigh ached. She was becoming numb to the pain. Instead of being alert and focused, she felt drowsy. Her mind couldn’t handle sharp acuity. Her body wanted to quit.
    Mateo stopped for a short rest, sharing a bottle of water that he must have picked up at the gift shop. Then he dug into his supplies for a little bag of magic: gummy bears. Emma accepted a handful with delight. Mateo was her new favorite person. The candy was a real lifesaver. He offered a few gummy bears to Chloe, who popped them into her mouth. The instant sugar rush lifted her spirits.
    She could do this. She could keep going.
    They continued their staggering journey toward the park at the end of the peninsula. Emma walked beside Chloe, holding her hand. The little girl was tired of being carried, and the extra weight on Chloe’s injured side was uncomfortable. She hoped the tsunami warning was a false alarm.
    Embarcadero Park was a grassy area interspersed with picnic tables and domed pavilions. It was on higher ground, so that was good. But also bad, because climbing would be difficult for Chloe.
    Whoosh-boom.
    Air sucked out and pressure slammed in as something exploded in the distance. It sounded as if a pile of fireworks had gone off, or the guys on the naval base had decided to test everything in their artillery at once.
    She swooped up Emma and looked over her shoulder in dismay. The bay was on fire. The water in the bay was on fire.
    Chloe was no science expert, but she understood the basics. Water didn’t burn. So there was something on the surface, a type of fuel or chemical. More explosions followed the first. Huge clouds of fire burst on the shore like atomic bombs. There had been a major malfunction at the military base. Maybe the airport.
    It didn’t really matter. The important part was that a lot of